What do you say while waiting?

A number of people have asked me, “What is happening with your church project?” This is in reference to a fifty year old abandoned church building in Lancaster County, PA, that Nancy and I hope to purchase and transform into our home.

The first answer that comes to mind is, “Not much.” That is not an accurate or complete answer. There is activity, but it is behind the scenes and does not require our involvement.

Our initial closing date to purchase the property was this week. However, there are a couple items that we need to know before we can comfortably purchase the property. We have asked the sellers to provide written assurance that the neighbor will abandon the well that currently prohibits the construction of a septic system on the church property. We have also asked the sellers to assure us in writing that the vertical structural posts and floor joists in the front part of the church building do not touch the ground. (They should sit on concrete foundation and footers.) Correcting these issues after purchase would increase the cost of the project and make it nonviable.

Gathering this information is taking the sellers longer than the current closing date allows, so our realtors are working to establish a new closing date, probably closer to mid-February. This delay is okay with Nancy and me. We are not in a rush and this gives us more time to work on other tasks, like our real jobs … oh, and packing, getting rid of stuff, and preparing our current house to sell.

Over the past weekend, I cleaned out my office. I packed the stuff that I want to keep such as the Caleb Project archives and my Frank Laubach library and I gave away other items, including 200 books. I also painted a couple red walls in our dining and living rooms to make them more neutral and hopefully more appealing to buyers.

Fortunately, my work right now is mostly on the computer and phone. I am consulting with several ministry leaders and can do most of that from my desk. Next week I am scheduled to go to Patterson, NJ to facilitate a planning meeting with a ministry there. After those meetings, I plan to travel to Pennsylvania to directly engage in the “church project.”